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Bergy Bits and Growlers Very small chunks of floating ice that rise only about 1 meter / 3 feet out of the water are called "growlers". When trapped air escapes as the iceberg melts, it sometimes makes a sound like the growl of an animal, and that's how growlers got their name. Small icebergs, rising between 1-4 meters / 3-13 feet out of the water are called "bergy bits". These may be small icebergs in the latter stages of melting, iceberg fragments, or pieces of floebergs or hummocked ice. Bergy bits may sound cute, but they can still be dangerous to ships because they are harder to see than large icebergs. A "floeberg" is a massive piece of sea ice composed of pressure ridges or hummocks (ice that rises up because of movement of the pack ice or the pressure of ice floes jamming and crushing against each other) and which has separated from the ice pack. It may typically protrude up to 5 meters / 16 feet above sea level. As the ice pack is frozen sea / salt water, floebergs - unlike true icebergs - are not frozen freshwater and would not make good ice cubes for your drink.
Click pictures for more information and credits. Library: Arctic, Icebergs, Ice, Glaciers Links: Arctic, Icebergs, Glaciers Maps: Source of Icebergs Arctic Maps & Weather Reports |
DICTIONARY: Just "double-click" any unlinked word on this page for the definition from Merriam-Webster's Student Electronic Dictionary at Word Central. |
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ARCTIC LIBRARY & GLOSSARY: Check this section for an index of the rest of the things you really need to know about the Arctic. |
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ARCTIC MAPS & WEATHER REPORTS: Maps of the Northwest Passage, explorers' routes, iceberg sources, Nunavut, the Arctic by treeline, temperature... |
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ARCTIC LINKS: Even more information! Links to sites related to the Arctic and "Iceberg: the Story of the Throps and the Squallhoots". |
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GUIDE TO ARCTIC SUNRISE & SUNSET: How much sunlight or darkness is there in the Arctic on each day of the year? |